Dried figs

How they are made

Picked in the early morning when the neck has bent and the fruit hangs. Split most of the way through, laid cut side up on wooden trays with fly mesh stretched over them, and put on trestles in full sun. They come inside every evening before the dew falls and go back out after the sun has burned it off in the morning.

Three days if the week is hot and dry, five if it is not. They are done when the flesh is tacky but no longer wet in the middle and the skin has gone leathery. Then they rest in a sealed box for a week, which evens out the moisture between the drier and wetter ones, and only then are they packed.

The whole method, including the parts that go wrong, is written out in the note on drying figs without a dehydrator.

Why they are brown

Commercial dried figs are usually treated with sulphur dioxide, which stops them browning and keeps them soft and pale for a long time. We do not do that. Ours oxidise as they dry and go a deep brown, sometimes with a bloom of natural sugar on the surface that looks like mould and is not. It rubs off between your fingers and tastes of sugar.

They are also firmer than the ones in a supermarket packet, because those are usually rehydrated slightly before packing. If you want them softer, five minutes in warm water or a splash of brandy overnight will do it.

What they are good with

Cheese, particularly with something salty and hard.
Chopped into a winter stew with lamb or pork, where they melt down and thicken it.
Split, stuffed with an almond off our own trees, and grilled for two minutes.
Soaked in red wine and eaten with cream.

How long they keep

Twelve months in a sealed container somewhere cool and dark. If they harden more than you like, that is not spoilage, it is just further drying. In a warm kitchen they can sweat and go sticky, in which case eat them sooner. Anything actually spoiled will smell fermented and you will know.

How to order

There is no checkout on this site. Send us an email saying what you would like and how many, and we will reply with a total including postage and how to pay. Orders go out on Tuesdays.

Email hello@nossoparaiso.com, or use the form on the contact page if that is easier.

Minimum order is six jars or bottles, mixed however you like. Postage within mainland Portugal is 6.50 euros for up to six, 9.00 euros for up to twelve. Mainland EU is 18.00 euros for up to six and 26.00 for up to twelve. We do not ship outside the EU. Full detail is on the questions page.

This year and last year

There were almost no dried figs from the 2025 crop. The July heat cooked the fruit on the tree before it ripened and what we picked was too small to split and dry properly. We ran out in November 2025 and had nothing until this year.

The 2026 drying is finishing now, at the end of August. Boxes will be ready to send from the second week of September, and we will have a normal quantity for the first time in two years.